O futuro da Internet

Tema proposto numa discussão da Diplo Foundation: One of the common assertions in the Internet Governance debate is that any future Internet Governance regime should preserve the key principle of Internet architecture - “end-to-end networking.” The usual justification propounded is that this networking architecture facilitated the Internet’s rapid development as well as the promotion of certain values, including creative freedom and freedom of expression. The question of Internet architecture has been in the focus of the US-based discussion on “net neutrality”. Should the technical solution based on “end-to-end networking” be the basis for a future Internet Governance regime? What are the strengths and weaknesses of this approach? What are the main forces against the current architecture of the Internet? Please focus on these and other questions you find appropriate.

Meus comentários: Zittrain stated in his article “The Generative Internet” that the Internet was built to be open to any sort of device: any computer or other information processor could be part of the new network so long as it was properly interfaced. These principles and their implementing protocols have remained essentially unchanged since the Internet comprised exactly two network subscribers, even as the network has grown to reach hundreds of millions of people in the developed and developing worlds.

This openness and the generative capability are end products of the “end-to-end networking” principle, which sustains that it is better to have a “dumb” network with little comprehension of the content being transmitted and the “power” - languages, software and other applications - at the client. This allows individuals to control their destiny – to create the World Wide Web, YouTube, Wikipedia, Facebook, free software, and much more.

The phrase “bits are bits” is a metaphor for this impartiality. Video bits on YouTube are no different to the network than angry political text in the blogosphere. Defenders of Net Neutrality (NN) set this argument as one of the main arguments in favor of democracy, creativity, unmediated innovation and consumer rights, since this non-discriminatory treatment of information as equal “bits” makes access to knowledge possible in a non-discriminatory way and provides necessary openness for development. Reinforcing this argument, IGF Athens Agenda declared that openness, when associated with the free and evenhanded flow of information and knowledge, is a “founding principle and characteristic of the Internet”.

However, the Internet begins plays an ever-increasing role in the economy and, as technical capabilities of identifying certain packets and treating them differently grow, new criteria for discriminating against certain types of traffic are technically feasible. It is possible now to discriminate some kinds of bits from others.

The discussions of implementation of these new criteria confirm that technology is not neutral; it is always formatted to reflect the interest of the people that built it. The stakeholders in this debate are, in the side that favors neutrality, companies such as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, NGOs such as CEA and Free Press and academics such as Lessig and Tim Wu. The opponents are the actors from the “old” and “mass-mediated” information economy such as Hollywood and broadcasters, and telecom companies that base their revenue on traffic payment.

But what are the implications of abandoning the idea of “bits are bits”? And how should future Internet Governance regimes deal with neutrality, taking into account the different levels of economic development of the countries and actors that are part of this dispute?

The end-to-end approach should prevail, under a regulated system that take into account the Internet as a public good. This should be the rule at least for the time needed for some goals be reached, such as building capacity and breaking the huge digital division in developing countries that are particularly exposed to the negative effects of Internet fragmentation.

Moreover in cases such as Brazil, the 1988 Constitution established the right to education, culture and access to information, without regard to color, religion or social class. It further establishes the right to be protected against negative results from technological development. Brazil is a country where just 10% of the population of almost 190 million people has Internet access. And of those, almost 90% are dial-up, and growth is slow since the prices are unreachable for most people.

Thus, the end of NN would affect strongly the possibilities of development in Brazil and other developing countries. In addition to the points made above, it would impose huge barriers to projects related to universalization of access, flow of information, and the access to new services based on applications such as VoIP, debilitating process of technological transference and access to technological enhancements and to knowledge in general.

Zittrain, Jonathan L. The Generative Internet. 119, Harvard Law Review. 2006. http://www.harvardlawreview.org/issues/119/may06/zittrain.pdf

“W3C, The Rule of Least Power. 2006. http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/leastPower

Noam, E. (2006). A third way for net neutrality. Financial Times [online]. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/acf14410-3776-11db-bc01-0000779e2340.html

For more information about the debate on NN and Consumer Rights refer to: Why Consumers Demand Internet Freedom. http://www.freepress.net/docs/nn_fact_v_fiction_final.pdf

Bocache, Mikheyev and Paque, The Network Neutrality Debate and Development. March 2007. p. 5. http://www.diplomacy.edu/poolbin.asp?IDPool=453.

Idem, p. 11.

NN: a crucial factor to enhance the flow of technology and content

“Information is an activity; information is a life form;

and information is a relation.”

J. P. Barlow

The Internet opened the possibility of breaking barriers of space, time and money, by developing an environment where people can innovate and express all the complexity of a human being. This innovation can be noticed in a very diverse range of knowledge and economics. Projects and services such as You Tube, Skype, Jamendo, Global Voices, OhmyNews , the wikis and the Free Software movement are great examples. This precise component helps to define the Information Society: a stage of the social development characterized by the capacity of its members in obtaining and share information, at any moment, from any place and in the manner that is most useful for them.

What gives the Internet this quality is what is called Network Neutrality (NN). The concept of NN derived from the age of the telegram, where the content was routed 'equally'. There was no effort to discern contents or adjusting for any kind of specific application. The question that is raised is why NN is important for a developing country such as Brazil? Information and communication technologies (ICT) – and the Internet as a part of it – have fundamentally changed the way we live, work, communicate and conduct business. Most of the world’s poorest people have not yet to experience the benefits of ICT, and the digital divide between the haves and have-nots continues to widen with time. This is the reality in Brazil.

A country with almost 190 million people, Brazil only had 10 percent of the population had access to Internet, and from those, almost 90% were dial access (source: ANATEL and IBGE). The great majority are in the industrial regions South and Southeast. Overall, this is a function of price; broadband prices in Latin America are still expensive when compared to the United States and Europe. Despite the significant growth in broadband subscriptions across most Latin American countries, broadband penetration rates are extremely low as a result of low per-capita incomes, relatively high broadband prices and poor availability of broadband services.

The Information Society means open space and opportunities for people in the Internet and in the traditional communication media to be capable of developing and sharing values, ideas and product content, as customers and producers. NN is central, because it preserves four important freedoms: (a) the access to content; (b) to run applications; (c) to attach devices and (d) to obtain service plan information; and these freedoms are essential to the learning process required to a person play a qualified role in the Information Society.

In terms of in developing countries, NN makes people capable of choosing their own opportunities and the roles they want to play, without facing barriers of different prices or different treatment of the information and technology that they want to access and share.

NN in Internet helps on the consolidation of democracy and social cohesion. Processes of filtering, quotation and accreditation, as suggested by Yochai Benkler, are key instruments to build a process of belonging. Specifically regarding the consolidation of the democracy in Brazil, the NN helps to guarantee the constitutional right to enjoy the benefits from the scientific progress, which means: (a) the right to access the benefit from the scientific and technological progress, (b) the right to set the priorities for research and (c) the right to be protected from the threatening results from this scientific progress; and other constitutional right such as the freedom of speech and information.

Consequently, the impact of losing NN in a developing country like Brazil would be the building of another tall hurdle to jump in the economic development. The lack of NN might place barriers on people from developing countries to participate in the global village and to nationalize the benefits of ICT for their economic and social development. This does not mean, however, that current diversity of the internet would not be preserved. Nevertheless, the internet is the reflection of different interests, and these interests are grouped into communities and people, as social beings, that would be part of communities that reflects their identity and their own diversity.

O que é a Internet?

Por quase duas horas tivemos uma maravilhosa discussão sobre o que é a Internet e a partir de qual perspectiva deveríamos definir a Internet. Nesse meio tempo, cair na necessidade de regular ou não a Internet foi inevitável.

Entretanto, lhes pergunto: “Qual internet queremos?” e mais ainda, “qual internet queremos para um país em desenvolvimento como o Brasil?”.

Lembrando Prof. Yochai Benkler, no seu livro The Wealth of Networks

“Information, Knowledge, and culture are central to human freedom and human development. How they are produced and exchanged in our society critically affects the way we see the state of the world as it is and might be (…)”

Resumo vindo de uma especialista em public good e energia - Nives Dolšak

Public Good: Content and free speech

Public Good: Protocols

All rely on infrastructure – that is not public good

Neste ponto, todos concordaram. : - )

Tendo em vista o resumo acima, qual internet queremos e qual a regulação que deve existir ou não para atingir a Internet que queremos?

Não sei vocês, mas eu quero uma Internet livre, sem barreiras que possam ser identificadas, em maior ou menor nível, com censura. Uma rede que permita abrir portas para oportunidades e para que a criatividade da sociedade brasileira transforme-se em educação e desenvolvimento. Daqui há pouco escreverei sobre algo que para mim é fundamental...neutralidade da rede. Agora é hora do jantar.

Internet: Metáforas

by U. Gasser

1 – Transport system – “tubos”

2 – Real state system – “lugares”

3 – Publishing system – “autores”

4 – Theater – “atores”

Public good: o que é isso???? A vez dos economistas

Começamos com algo assim: o que eu uso não impede ou diminui o que você poderá utilizar, ontem, hoje ou amanha. (aqui já surgem algumas duvidas....já que a água ou o ar é considerado public good....mas se os EUA não assinarem o Protocolo Kyoto...não sei se o ar será public good por muito tempo....).

Da wikipedia em português: “Em economia, Bem Público é um bem não-rival e não-exclusivo. Há ainda, uma característica de indivisibilidade, o que faz com que todo indíviduo tenha acesso à mesma disponibilidade do bem público.

Bem público não é nescessariamente um bem provido pelo Estado, mas a intervenção dos governos é necessária para aumentar o bem-estar da população.

Defesa nacional, Iluminação Pública e Praças, são alguns exemplos de bens públicos pois seu consumo é feito por vários indivíduos sem que seu custo seja maior do que se fosse destinado a somente um indivíduo.”

Tough love e a Internet

O começo foi: “uma das poucas coisas que concordamos no Berkman Center é que a internet é algo importante, sendo que um dos pontos centrais que devem guiar tal determinação é o openess e o quanto este tipo de posicionamento pró-acesso ao conhecimento incentiva a inovação, principalmente em campos como a educação.”

A proposta: utilizar a multidisciplinariedade do grupo convidado para traçar projetos e policies a serem adotadas.

Metodologia: brainstorm e apresentação de casos, conforme listado no cronograma do seminário (http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ipg/Schedule).

E para você - que tem interesse em ler o que tento aqui escrever (obrigada, muita honra) - a Internet é importante em quais termos e desde que salvaguardados quais princípios?

Internet as a Public Good

Começa hoje, aqui em Boston, o simpósio "Internet as a Public Good". Serão dois dias de debates com especialistas na área e com as mais diferentes backgrounds e eu consegui um lugar em uma das cadeirinhas! Para maiores informações sugiro o site do próprio simpósio: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ipg/Main_Page

Ademais da bibliografia indicada na pagina http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ipg/Background, sugiro:

1 - http://www.diplomacy.edu/ig/Research/default.asp

2 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good

3- http://danny.oz.au/free-software/advocacy/oicampaign.html

Neste blog, que hoje começo, vou tentar manter um resumo do que acontece aqui em Boston e áreas próximas relacionado a temas como desenvolvimento, propriedade intelectual, acesso ao conhecimento, reforma do sistema de patentes, universidades e patentes e inovação.